Austria Annexes Dark Land
by CosmicKitten89
Summary: When Ludwig von Koopa visits his mother in Austria, she decides that, after spending so much time with Bowser, that he needs to be straightened out - and who better to do that than Roderich Edelstein!
1. A Mess

**Hey, I want to finish the next chapter of Born to be King and put it on here, but the chapter's stored on my computer at home and I'm not at home now, so I'm doing this so I can put something up while I'm here at this… ahem… crisis house :S**

**Yes, I'm a mess, so this story is sort of about Ludwig being a mess.**

**Anyway, I have recently gotten interested in Hetalia, and fallen in love with Roderich Edelstein, aka Austria, and I just HAD to put a fic out there about him, and I'm dipping my toes into new waters by crossing over with Hetalia…**

**Having noted the similarities between Roderich and Ludwig von Koopa (I even have a picture on my deviantART account that I drew of Ludwig looking like Roderich!) I decided to make it a crossover with the Mario/Koopalings canon, that takes place between a few of the chapters of Born to be King, so enjoy!**

**I do not own Hetalia or the characters of the Mario canon, and I certainly do not own any of the brands of candy and stuff that might be mentioned.**

Sofia glared at her son. Ludwig was a mess, even worse than he had been during his Frankenstein University days. His hair matted and sticky with candy that his – AGAIN - less than an hour after she had carefully coiffed it to the bushy Beethoven-esque hairstyle that she liked it to be in. He smelled from not having bathed in the year that he had been at his father's. His eyes were bloodshot from all of the espresso he had been drinking, and his teeth were probably rotten from all of the candy he had been eating without a competent parent to monitor his sugar intake. She was about to find out, when she took him to the dentist that she now had no time to make him presentable for.

And sure enough, they were.

Ludwig cried, both at the pain and the indignity, as his four cavities were being drilled, insisting that they drug him with general anesthetic to make him completely unconscious. The dose wore off just in time for him to be conscious of the nightmarish root canal.

Ludwig left the dentist's office crying and begging for _Mozartkugeln_ chocolate and a melange to wash it down with to comfort him, even though his taste buds were too numb from novocaine to taste it. He screamed out in want as his mother stopped at a red light by a McDonald's.

"Fast food? Your father has been feeding you FAST FOOD?"

"It's my guilty pleasure," the young Ludwig whimpered.

His mother ran the red light to get the burger joint out of the five-year-old's sight. "We are going home and we are eating _Wienerschnitzel_for dinner."

Ludwig remembered how upset he had been when he discovered that the restaurant in Dark Land that was called Wienerschnitzel did not in fact serve the Viennese dish, or anything similar in even a remote, Americanized fashion. He rather looked forward to his favorite dish from home.

"Will there be _Sachertorte_?"

"After today's dental exam? _NEIN!__"_

Ludwig ate his _Schnitzel_with his hands while his mother reminded him to mind his manners, first softly, then sternly.

Ludwig bitterly sipped his unsweetened melange. Unsweetened caffeine is still caffeine, after all.

"I see that you are actually enjoying that decaffeinated espresso," Sofia remarked.

Ludwig spat it out. No wonder he still felt drowsy and terrible.

"So how's school?" his _Onkel_Wolfgang asked. "Hear old King Koopa's putting you through the system, is that so?"

Ludwig drowsily hung his head.

"Well THAT'S the problem! Public education! He should be up at my alma mater earning a Ph. D. in Mad Science just like his good old _Groβonkel_!"

"It's a private school, actually," Ludwig said, noting inwardly that it made little difference.

"And it's an elementary school am I correct? That is simply…"

Wolfgang started screaming and convulsing.

"_Onkel_, are you all right?" Sofia asked.

"I'm fine, just another seizure, that's all. Anyway, Ludwig should be at graduate school right now! Tell me do they have any fine graduate schools in Dark Land?"

"_Onkel,_can't you see that Ludwig is not quite ready? Remember what a wreck he was when he came back from earning his Bachelor's?"

"So he gained the freshman fifteen, big deal."

"And he's gaining a Dark Land dozen on top of that!"

Ludwig blushed in shame as his mother sharply poked him in the gut.

"It can hardly be helped, considering my genetics," Ludwig retorted, poking his mother back in her own prodigious gut. "And we both have personal experience with how large my father is".

"Such attitude! And that is NOT necessarily true! Look, _Onkel_isn't fat!"

"I have always wondered about that," Ludwig mused, eyeing Wolfgang's bony figure with a flash of considerable envy.

"Tell me, Ludwig, what happened to the sweet cultured boy that I laid and hatched?"

"Ha, it just goes to show, you can't change what he's going to become!" said Wolfgang.

"A lowbrowed, boorish, ill-mannered despot like his father."

"NO! The espresso habit, the lack of sleep and hygiene, the intense craving for simple carbs that provide energy and theobromine that helps with his mood… he is a born scientist! He's taking after his good old great-uncle Wolfgang!"

Wolfgang patted Ludwig on the head. His hand got covered with dried, powdery chocolate residue that had been stuck in his hair for ages.

"Still, my young Boltzmann, you've got to bathe every ONCE in a while…"

"_Mutter,__Vater_, would you please do me a favor and bathe him?" Sofia asked. "I have got some important decisions to make right now…"

Sofia's father Wilhelm banged on the table and shouted, "AND ALLOW THE BOY TO TAKE AWAY FROM MY VIOLIN TIME?"

Sofia apologized, remembering that her father was recovering from a stroke and had a hard enough time as it was learning how to play the violin one-handed.

Sofia's mother Josephine left the table and griped about how she never had any time to enjoy her old age and work on her research. She grabbed Ludwig by the hair and dragged him to the nearest bathroom.

"We need to put some culture back into his life," muttered Sofia. "That father of his is ruining him."

"Hey, you can't change what he is," said Wolfgang. "He did get half of his genes from the King, after all."

"But he's got the heart of an artist, can you not see that! He has an indelible passion for music and science, he brings a scientific sense of experimentalism, precision, and wonder to music, and an artistic flair to the sciences. He is literally LIGHTYEARS ahead of the entire world…"

"Us, even," admitted Wolfgang.

Sofia nodded in acknowledgement of her inadequacy. "And the stress of being put through school with those that are so far behind him, not to mention dealing with such an idiot for a father, is… overwhelming… and that's why he's behaving the way he is."

Sofia sighed. "I have a feeling that he is not being allowed to be what he wants to be, and this behavior of his is in a sort of rebellion… I am not trying to chage him… I am simply trying to peel back the layers of scum to expose the cultured pearl that lies inborn within!"

"Ha, to use that analogy, he was already becaming scum-coated while living with us! He spent more time going crazy in the lab with me than he did on your musical training!"

"And that's why I believe that, during this month that he has away from that so-called school his father has sentenced him to, he should spend his time in the most cultured house in the country, away from you."

"You don't mean…"

"The house of Austria. Roderich Edelstein himself."

"Haha, did you see what happened to Italy after he shoved culture down his throat? Italy used to be the cultural epicenter of Europe! Now, compared to Austria, it is filthy and poor, and Mr. Italy himself is a whiny loser who does nothing but flirt with the other countries, male and female, and obsess over pasta! PASTA! Suddenly I've got a craving for PASTA!"

Wolfgang was laughing like crazy.

"Wolfgang, calm down! Have you taken your medication today?"

"No, you took it away from me after I overdosed that one time, remember? HEEHEEHEEHEE!"

"Well, we don't serve pasta here. You know that. And tomorrow I will ask Mr. Austria if he will do us a favor and straighten this young country out. It might not have worked on Italy, but our son is different, and I believe that he will relish this opportunity. He will study music from this master, learn how to prepare the finest foods, be schooled in manners and how to groom himself, and pretty much spend his visit away from my parents."

Wilhelm dropped the violin whose head he had been trying to hold in his mostly paralyzed left fingers.

"_Gott verdammte!"_

Wolfgang laughed. "Hey, pops, perhaps you should switch to the cello!"

Josephine screamed and scolded Ludwig for biting her.

"_Vater_ needs to recover, and _Mutter,_ well, needs her alone time."

"But it's not often that Ludwig gets to visit us anymore! How much harm can one month do? I WANT TO SPEND TIME WITH MY GRAND NEPHEW!"

"Well he doesn't need that right now. He needs to be purified."

"Just for a week?"

"We'll see how it works out. You can visit if you behave yourself. Perhaps you should work on your music?"

"Sofia…"

"You're just as talented as the rest of the family."

"But Sofia... my parents FORCED me to play those instruments!"

Wolfgang ran, screaming, back to his lab.

"You get back here, you haven't had your medication!"


	2. Feelings

"So, Ludwig, how are you feeling?" Sofia asked as she combed her son's wet hair.

"Physically or emotionally?"

"Well… both, then."

"Physically, I feel terrible. My mouth feels strange from having been excavated, and now that the anesthetic is wearing off, I am beginning to feel what will be an intense and long-lasting pain."

"Perhaps I was too harsh on you, restricting you from dessert. Would that _Sachertorte_make you feel better?"

"Yes, please, it would. And with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream on the side, if you please."

Sofia went to the refrigerator to cut Ludwig a slice of the Viennese dessert and scoop the requested flavor of ice cream to place on the side in lieu of the usual unsweetened whipped cream.

Ludwig frowned as he put the ice cream into his mouth. His new fillings were painfully sensitive to temperature.

"So, how are you feeling emotionally?" Sofia asked.

Ludwig found that even the refrigerated frosting of the_Sachertorte_ was too cold for his fillings. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, it seems clear to me that you are not feeling well for some reason. Would you like to talk about it?"

"First may I please have a hot _Mokka_? I don't have much appetite for cold foods right now."

Sofia put the nibbled-on piece of cake back into the fridge and prepared a hot mocha espresso for her son, using the unadulterated brew in anticipation of Ludwig's plea of "caffeinated, if you don't mind".

Ludwig took a _Mozartkugeln_out of the crystal candy dish, littered the carpet with its wrapper and popped it into his mouth, chewing on the side that had not been inflicted by a root canal. When his mother was done with his Mokka, he sipped but recoiled at the heat, realizing that his fillings were also heat-sensitive.

Sofia sighed at the foil wrapper he left on the floor. "Ludwig, you had never been so disrespectful, you always used to throw your trash away!"

"Sorry, I'm just used to being in a house that is already utterly trashed, that's all." He unwrapped another _Mozartkugeln_ and swallowed it whole. "You cannot imagine the stress I have to endure on a daily basis, attending that school that makes you sit in class most of the day, and then be forced to have a recess in the hot sun, with little to no supervision to prevent the thugs from physically harassing me, and with nothing but infantile educational materials to play with inside the classroom! They call it a _Kindergarten_, heaven knows why, for it's really more of a _Kinderlager__…_

"And then I come home to King Dad, as he insists that I call him, for him to insult me and boss me around and breathe fire on me and lock me in the dungeon as punishment! Not to mention my half-siblings…"

"He has… of course." Sofia said, not surprised at all that Bowser had fathered children of different mothers.

"The next-eldest one physically harasses me whenever he gets the chance, the girl forces me to play with her and throws temper tantrums to have our father force me to participate if I don't, the middle child never shuts up and annoys me with loud guitar noise that he thinks is music, and the youngest hatched is always stealing my coins and my candies that I have imported from here! And that's not even counting the two eggs that I have put in a time-decelerated incubator to prevent them from hatching sooner… I don't think I want them to hatch just yet…"

"Well, I'm sorry, dear, but your father has all custody rights to you, and all I can do is demand a one-month visitation with you every year."

Ludwig angrily wiped away the tear that had formed in his eye. "And though you had to ruin it by taking me to have the dental exam that my father had indefinitely postponed, I am quite glad to be having this visitation early."

"Early? Isn't it holiday at that school of yours?"

"Well…" Ludwig pulled an Austrian-made handkerchief out of his shell and wiped his face with it. "The assignment was to create a picture book that teaches the integers one through ten. I showed them my number theory project that I completed at Frankenstein University, and the teacher scolded me, having decided that it was unsatisfactory because of its lengthiness and the abstractness of its illustrations. I told her that it had earned me an _Eins_ at Frankenstein University, and the teacher failed me for recycling a project from a previous class. And I got so mad and… frustrated, I actually began to exhibit behavior akin to my father's… I… threw a pair of cheap useless plastic scissors at the teacher… didn't even leave a cut on her… and she suspended me… for an entire month."

"Oh, baby…" Sofia picked up her son, put him in her lap and hugged him while rocking.

"Good riddance, I say."

"Can you promise me you won't throw anything at Mr. Austria when I take you to stay at his house tomorrow?"

"Mr… what?"

"Roderich von Edelstein, he's the national personification of our country."

"I am… still confused, _Mutter.__"_

Sofia sighed. "So am I, _mein__Sohn_. So am I."

**I know, two chapters and still no Austria :( Don't worry, fellow Austria fans, I promise there will be plenty of him in the next chapter! :D 3 **


	3. Meeting Mister Austria

**Yay! Ludwig's POV! :D**

"He's just what the doctor ordered to straighten you out!"

"He'll be the finest music teacher you'll ever have!"

"You're missing out on culture, and there is no better person to school you in culture than him!"

The more_ Mutter_ discusses the matter, the more apprehensive I become. Am I being sent to a music school or a charm school? Or perhaps I am being sent somewhere worse…

_Mutter _points out the car window every few minutes to educate me on the nearest piece of Austrian culture.

"Look, Ludwig, there's the _Narrenturm._ Did you know that it is continental Europe's oldest insane asylum?"

I tense up and scream. "DON'T! _ONKEL _TOLD ME ABOUT THOSE PLACES! THEY ARE MOST UNACCOMMODATING!"

"Ludwig, what ever made you think I was taking you to the Lunatics' Tower?"

"Because…"

"_Mein __Sohn,_ the _Narrenturm_ is not even a psychiatric hospital anymore. It's only a museum. You are not going to a psych ward."

"_Onkel_ said that people will lie to supposed lunatics to keep them from throwing a tantrum as they are are taken away!"

_Mutter_ sighs. "This is why I am taking you away from your _Onkel_. _Onkel_ Wolfgang is mentally ill, and sometimes, quite honestly, I wonder how he made it out of the psych ward. Especially considering what sort of environment you have been forced by your father to live in, you need to spend your months in Vienna in a safe, cultured environment, which is more than I can provide for you at home at this time."

_Mutter_ drives up to a mansion, practically a palace, that is larger than our own von Shellz manor. The front door opens to a ballroom that is even larger than the one at Castle Koopa, if one could call that a ballroom. I feel a jolt of excitement at the sound of a familiar piano tune being played on a magnificent piano at the far end of the ballroom. The pianist is a tall but delicately framed man with pale skin and dark hair, clad in a blue outfit straight out of the 18th century.

I walk closer to the man, somewhat hesitantly, for, as I watch how swiftly and gracefully his fingers stroke the keys, and how flawlessly he plays the composition, perfect down to the very last note, I realize that I am in the presence of a true master.

I turn around to see that _Mutter_ has already left. Intimidated, but at the same time curious, I take a deep breath and will myself to approach the musician.

The musician seems unaware of my presence as I look up at him. His eyes are closed in passionate concentration, behind glasses frames that make him appear decidedly more elegant, and sweat is beginning to bead on his forehead. Envious of the master's delicate white fingers, I watch patiently as they fly across the keys until Mozart's 12th piano concerto comes to an end.

The man wipes his forehead with a fine linen handkerchief and opens his eyes, and turns to face me. His eyes are large and indigo in color, with a clear, lucid sparkle.

"You are the young country that has been turned over to the care of Austria, am I correct?"

"Um... well I..." I am tongue-tied, and slightly confused by the man's sentence.

"Well, pleasure to make your acquaintance, young Mister Dark Land. I am Roderich von Edelstein, but you may call me Mister Austria."

"D-Dark Land? My name is Ludwig-"

"I would rather call you Dark Land, if you don't mind, to avoid confusion with that other country whose name is Ludwig," Mister Austria snaps. "Now, since you belong to me now, I am going to supervise all of the industry and politics in your land. The only thing you have to do is loyally obey me without asking any questions. Do you have any questions?"

Well, better him than King Dad. Confused as I am as to how Mister Austria is going to supervise Dark Land's industry and politics, never mind how he would get my father to allow him to do that, I am nevertheless sick with giddiness in anticipation of being schooled by this master of masters, and thus have only one question in mind to ask him.

"When can I start?"

"Right now. But first I have to find appropriate attire for you to wear."

I giggle. He's going to dress me in the same elegant formal clothing that he is wearing! What glee!

"Shut up with the giggling, it's annoying."

Mister Austria, already back from his upstairs linen closet, throws the clothing at my face.

I shove the clothing off my face and gasp. It is servant's clothing, and female servant's clothing at that, and quite old-looking, like clothing displayed as an exhibit at a history museum.

"But Mister Austria, these are maid's clothes."

"I know. These were the very same rags that Italy wore when he was part of my former empire. I see no point in buying new ones when there is nothing wrong with these that a bit of patching cannot fix."

I notice, as I pull the dress on, that it does indeed need patching; there are burn holes, moth holes, and it has long since been stained with tomato sauce and yellow age.

I gape at Mister Austria, before turning away from his cold but enchanting blue-violet stare to gape longingly at his piano.

"Oh, I see, you thought you were getting a turn on the piano! Pardon me while I scoff!"

Mister Austria scoffs for a bit, then grabs my hand to study my fingers.

"You do not have the hands to play piano! All you have is stubbly claws!"

"For your information, these stubbly claws placed SIXTH in the International Chopin Piano Competition!"

"Sixth! Ha! Why did you not place first!"

"What were you expecting? I am only five years old! That is far more than you can reasonably expect from any child at my age!"

"That is not an excuse. Mozart was already composing when he was your age."

"I have composed quite a few pieces myself," I retort. "What were YOU doing when you were my age?"

"I was out conquering other countries and building my empire. How's your empire coming along?"

I refrain from humiliating myself with discussion of the embarrassing state of my father's empire.

"Well things are going to change now that I am in charge, Mister Dark Land. In the meantime, since you are so precociously competent at musicianship, I suppose that I can reasonably expect you to perform simple tasks such as household sanitation."

Mister Austria pulls me painfully by the hair to a closet that contains a broom and a dustpan, both of which he throws at my face.

"Now get to sweeping! I want my ballroom to sparkle for the Opera Ball!"

I cannot help but fret over being forced to do such a dull task. I have often watched servants that spend their entire lives sweeping my father's castle, and I have wondered what sort of degenerate mind would be content with doing that for any period of time, let alone as a vocation.

Some cultural experience this turned out to be. Mister Austria ascends his staircase, and I then begin to hear him play on his other piano.

At least I will have lovely music to toil away to. Still, Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata being played at a time like this only serves to assist me in dwelling on my already damp mood.


	4. Sweeping and Mopping

My muscles become tired. I swish the broom back and forth on the floor. How do I know when I am done? Most of the debris is microscopic.

"And remember, Mister Dark Land, I want every single microscopic speck of debris to be gone," Mister Austria calls out from the next story up.

How unreasonable! Cleansing every spare particle out of the ballroom would be like trying to towel dry the Pacific Ocean!

I stop after I sweep clean the entire surface area of the ballroom, neglecting the underside of the piano, which would not shine in the shadows anyway.

Looks sparkly to me. Of course, it looked just as sparkly to begin with. I doubt that Mister Austria was capable of detecting microscopic specks anyway; he was probably exaggerating when he said that he wanted that.

I wait until he is finished with Chopin's Nocturne before I interrupt his peace by telling him that I am finished.

"I will be the judge of that."

Mister Austria descends the staircase and gets down on his knees, brushing his fingers over the floor.

"Very clean, it does sparkle. Now does the piano sparkle?"

He brushes his finger over the piano, picking up dust on it.

"The piano does not sparkle! How could you neglect the ballroom's very centerpiece!"

"M-Mister Austria, you did not tell me to clean the piano..."

"Do you not have any common sense? Did I not tell you that I wanted the entire ballroom to sparkle? Any _dummkopf_ would have the sense to know that a ballroom is not clean if the piano is not clean!"

Mister Austria kicks me over onto my belly and stomps on my bottom. I scream as he sprains my tail.

"I will do this to you from now on if you don't do what I say. Now I need you to mop the ballroom while I prepare dinner."

"M-mop it?"

"Yes, you will have to mop it, and then sweep it again. That is the only way to get it to sparkle properly. Now take this bucket of water to dip the mop in and wear these brushes on your feet while you are mopping so that you do not leave footprints. Do you think you can handle that?"

"Uh... I gape at the ballroom that I had just finished sweeping.

"Need I inform you that you will not be eating dinner until it is done."

Having been reminded of food, my stomach all of a sudden burns. "Yes, Mister Austria".

How can he expect me to have the energy to finish this task to the standard of perfection that he expects without eating? He should at least wait until after I have eaten to do this!

I spill the entire bucket on the floor and swish it around with the mop. The water suddenly becomes very dirty, from the microscopic specks that I have missed.

The chore will be duller, since Mister Austria is cooking instead of playing music. I carefully make my way across the slippery floor to the piano, staring at the smooth ivory keys that his beautiful fingers have touched, and reach my shaking hand over them.

"And you better not be touching my piano or I will stomp on you again!"

I sigh. My only option is to make my own music, using the one instrument that _Mutter _was always encouraging me to use more.

I take a deep breath and begin singing a few pieces from the opera _Carmen,_ in a voice that is utterly unrecognizable as my squeaky bubbly speaking voice.

Mister Austria does not seem to mind that I am singing as I work, so I presume that my performance is excellent. After I have swished the mop over the entire ballroom, I get the sudden reckless urge to dance over the near-frictionless floor. I turn pirouettes, trying to make myself turn as many times as possible, and then I pull my arms in to reduce my moment of inertia and thus increase my angular velocity the way a figure skater does.

"Dinner is finished - what are you doing?"

I turn my head around as I stag leap, which causes me to shift my equilibrium and crash when I reach the floor.

"You idiot! You made the floor all dirty again!"

Using a towel to avoid dirtying the floor, Mister Austria shimmies his way over to me and once again stomps on my rear.

"Now I want you to clean this entire floor again or you will go hungry tonight! And no singing if it distracts you from your job."

"Owww... yes, Mister Austria."

I turn around to look at my throbbing tail. It may be permanently bent out of shape.


	5. Vienna Sausage

After what feels like an hour, I finally finish mopping the floor. Now if I could only make it dry faster so I could begin sweeping it...

Mister Austria comes out to check, and I hide inside my shell in case he wants to stomp on me again.

"Well it appears to be properly scrubbed down, now you can take a break to have dinner. And quit hiding in your shell, you coward!"

He kicks my shell and I pop out in alarm. He escorts me to the dining room.

Seeing how large the dining room is, I dread the time when he will ask me to clean it. He sits down to his meal as well, having politely waited for me to finish my chore before eating.

"Take note of how the table is set because you are going to set it next time."

The meal is nothing more than a sandwich with a frankfurter inside.

"Um, Mister Austria, why are we dining on cheap frankfurters?"

"They are called Vienna sausages in other countries, but we call them frankfurters because they were created in Frankfurt. Were you expecting me to cook you a fancy meal every night?"

"Well, yeah. My family does, and you appear to be even wealthier than they are."

"And that's why." Mister Austria takes a small bite of sausage and delicately pats his mouth with his handkerchief afterwards.

I flush in shame, recalling how I have neglected my etiquette while living with my father.

After mimicking Mister Austria and taking a bite, I find that it does not taste bad at all considering that it's commoner fare. Then again, perhaps I am simply used to eating cheap food from living with King Dad. Or then, perhaps Mister Austria is such a splendid cook that he can make the most out of the least.

"May I please have some dessert?" I ask, after I finish, to my shame, several bites ahead of Mister Austria.

"You are expecting to have dessert every night, are you not? That is not healthy! No wonder you are fat and have enough fillings to trigger a metal detector!"

"You are just being cheap again, aren't you, Mister Austria? If you are so rich, why do you not put all that money to good use and treat yourself?"

"Do you not realize that every _Schilling_ I spend on myself is a _Schilling_ I do not spend on the people? Why do you think our country is so prosperous? Why do you think you are able to play music and study all day instead of working like you might very well have to do if you lived in a country where the leaders are rather more indulgent? America, for instance, spends like he has a hole in his pocket, and his people are falling into debt just to get the education that we get here for free! He only lives in relative luxury because China is happy to work for him for lower wages than Americans would accept, and if he keeps it up he will have to borrow money from China that he will likely never pay back! But your pampered ass does not understand the principles of economics, do you?"

"I... beg to differ, Mister Austria." I reflect on how my father steals from his own people and spends it greedily, often going into debt himself, until his people are so poor that he has to expand his empire so he can have more money to steal. He uses very little, if any, of it to support education, which is why he sends me to school in the Mushroom Kingdom.

"But it seems to me that you are treating me the way America treats China!" I add. "Cheap labor! Tell me, how did you ever get these chores done without me?"

"Simple. I did them myself. But it helps to have another country such as you around to do them for me. That way I can spend more time on developing my country's economy. That is how empires become prosperous."

"But that isn't a fair trade! You get work out of me, and what do I get in return? You are being hypocritical by scorning America for treating China that way!"

"Quiet! I have your country do the unnecessary chores that I do not want to do, but that does not mean that your country gets nothing in return!"

I look up again at Mister Austria's face. He displays all the signs of being selfish and hypocritical, and yet somehow he does not strike me as such. Perhaps because his beauty, grace and outward elegance hides his character flaws. Perhaps that was why I had put up with his treatment.

"Now we shall wash the dishes. I will show you how, and you will do them every night from then on on your own. And then you shall sweep the ballroom, which should be dry by then, and then I will show you to your bedroom."

"Yes Mister Austria..."


	6. Draw a Circle

**OK, I really love writing Hetalia fanfiction because I get to blabber on about how GORGEOUS Austria is! ~ :3 **

**Seriously, for a laugh read Austria's lines while imagining him speaking in the accent he has in the dub! xD**

Morning dawns, and I lie awake in my oversized bed. At least Austria is accommodating when it came to assuring that his guests have a good night's sleep. I am so fatigued from yesterday's physical labor, and as my body sinks into the swansdown mattress covered with silky linen sheets, my brain sinks similarly back into slumber.

"Wake up, Mister Dark Land! It is time for breakfast!"

Breakfast? Well, I am hungry. But it's probably cheap rolls and toast without any jam or fresh butter, so I can wait...

I scream as I am dragged out of bed and stomped on.

"We have a schedule, Mister Dark Land! Now go downstairs and eat your breakfast!"

Mister Austria serves me toast with jam - what a surprise - a walnut muffin (stale of course) and a cup of coffee.

"Mister Austria, is this espresso or drip coffee?"

"Espresso."

"Fresh ground?"

"This morning, using sixty beans, as always, just as Beethoven always had it."

"It is not decaffeinated, is it?"

"Heavens, no. You'll need the caffeine to accomplish the tasks I have planned for you today."

I am happy to hear that Mister Austria at least doesn't cut corners when it comes to coffee. He scolds me for adding more than two sugar cubes, though, and he only allows me enough cream to make it a macchiato.

"May I please finish the rest of the coffee pot? So it doesn't go to waste?"

"Yes, I will allow you this one indulgence, but only if you will work hard today."

"With pleasure, Mister Austria." I meant it; my heart was already buzzing, and I felt like I could do almost any mundane physical task and still have a stupidly fun time dancing around and singing "tra la la" while doing it.

After I guzzled down the remainder of the espresso, Mister Austria asked me to come up the stairs with him to dust his instruments. I giddily bounce up the staircase, stupidly eager to see what a fine collection I am sure that he has.

I dust off the piano that he had been playing Moonlight Sonata on yesterday, and then he shows me into another room that has yet a THIRD piano, among other various instruments.

"H-how many pianos do you have, Mister Austria?"

"I have fifteen pianos, five harpsichords, two clavichords, a pipe organ, fourteen violins, six violas, seven cellos, a string base, six harps, thirteen flutes, three piccolos, four clarinets, six oboes, three bassoons, and a glockenspiel. And those are just the instruments that used to belong to famous Austrian composers."

"You mean that Mozart actually touched these keys?" I tilt my head to see the shine on the keys, wondering if I could find Mozart's fingerprints.

"Actually, this one belonged to Joseph Haydn. It has never been touched. You can dust the top off, but the keys are off limits. Some of my instruments have not been touched since their famed owners passed away, and I would like to keep them that way."

I dust off the instruments that he uses, and simply blow the dust off of the sacred ones. Mister Austria watches me, his violet-blue eyes appearing black in this light.

"OK, I believe I am done now, Mister-"

When I am finished dusting the cello, I find that Mister Austria has left the room. I hear the Chopin tune that he is so fond of playing in the next room.

As I nervously creak the door open to watch, the music stops.

"Well, don't just stand there. Sit down and listen!"

Mister Austria must enjoy showing off. I sit very close behind him, right beneath his coattails. I gently take hold of the fabric and find that, upon closer inspection, Mister Austria's clothing is not quite as fine as it appears at a distance.

When the Nocturne is concluded I let go of the coattail and crawl back so that he does not become angered at me for invading his personal space.

"Mister Dark Land, yesterday you asked what your country gets out of being part of my empire. Today I shall show you. Your country works for me, and my country in exchange shares with you its culture."

Mister Austria raised himself off from the piano seat and patted it.

"For sure, Mister Austria?"

"Yes, you shall play."

I hop onto the seat and read the music sheet at a glance. My caffeine-fueled fingers bang out the melody as swiftly as Mister Austria's, but Mister Austria is shaking his head disapprovingly, and, remembering how his performance sounded compared to mine, I know exactly why.

"Mister Dark Land, you are physically incapable of playing this piece the way it is meant to be played. Having only four fingers per hand, you are utterly useless as a classical pianist."

"Suppose you were to come across a race that was accustomed to playing keyboard instruments with SIX fingers," I respond. "They might consider YOU to be utterly useless as a classical pianist for having only FIVE fingers.

"I shall now express my utter anger and disgust with you through the piano," I add.

"Interesting, so your anger is expressed through Chopin too," Mister Austria muses.

"No, I shall play a piece that I composed on my own."

I pound my fingers over the keys feverishly, knowing what a difficult piece this is for me to play, being small and having too few fingers, as Mister Austria had pointed out. The caffeine definitely came in handy for helping me to swing my arms back and forth across the keyboard, but it made it difficult for me to play it at the slow tempo that I must in order to be able to reach those keys in time to play the right notes at the right time.

I end the performance with a thunderous chord, my entire body and especially my fingers twitching during the seconds between notes.

I had done it. FLAWLESSLY. I turn around to face Mister Austria, wide-eyed as though from madness, a twisted smile on my face.

Clearly, Mister Austria was stunned.

"N-not bad, all things considered."

"I believe that 'not bad' is rather modest praise, all things considered. What have YOU composed lately?"

"Sit down and listen. I shall perform a piece of my own design. And be QUIET!"

Mister Austria begins with a moving violin solo, and then he sits down to the piano and begins playing a melody that is simple and catchy enough to be a childrens' nursery song, but nonetheless magnificent and uplifting to the spirits. A few bars into the song, he begins singing, in a rich, lovely, perfectly-pitched voice that is so different from his usual harsh scolding tone:

"_Draw a circle, that's the earth,_

_Draw a circle, that's the earth_

_Draw a circle, that's the earth_

_My name is Austria._

_Draw a circle, that's the earth,_

_Gaze intently, it's the earth,_

_Could that circle be the earth?_

_My name is Austria._

_Aah, the world around us_

_Can be seen with the stroke of a single brush_

_I'm passionate about splendid music and art_

_I love them!"_

"In Vienna, from many musicians, many famous pieces of music were born," he says, pausing from the singing. "I shall now perform solely on the piano."

His fingers flutter flawlessly over the keys as he pauses for a piano instrumental, before singing again.

"_The heart of one is warmed upon_

_Listening to sweet harmony_

_Even if my vital regions are occupied"_

Mister Austria pauses from the singing to speak again.

"If I cannot bring my orchestra along, my heart will feel troubled."

Mister Austria spends a few bars rambling on about cakes and coffees at his cafe konditories, causing me to salivate, even as he turns to preaching against the hazards of overeating.

The melody takes on a frightful, thunderous mood, causing my heart to palpitate, until the melody settles back to a mellow mood, and then it changes to a heroic, triumphant mood, and then calms again when Mister Austria begins to sing again:

"_All the countries of this earth_

_Playing music of the world_

_And a major part of that_

_Is Austria, of course!_

_Aah, the world around us_

_Can be seen with the stroke of a single brush_

_The balls continue to the break of dawn_

_The walzer of love!_

_Aah, throughout this great world_

_There are recipes of happiness that sleep_

_Let's gather everyone and music we shall play!_

_Hetalia!"_

When the tune is completely wrapped up, I jump off the floor to give him a standing ovation.

"Bravo! Brilliant, simply brilliant! Encore, if you please! I am... humbled" I am not as loath to admit that as I thought I would have been...

"Well, of course, but it would sound so much better if I could get somebody to play flute and violin in the background. You are competent in both instruments, yes?"

"Of course."

"Well then, you shall practice... later. But right now you have hallways to sweep and a table to set up for dinner.

"Yes, Mister Austria."

My pent-up caffeine energy bursts out as I begin to sweep the hallway that is adorned with so many beautiful portraits, some of them from world-renowned artists, quite a few of them being portraits of Mister Austria himself. One of them had a moustache, which mystified me; the moustache does not suit him.

I find myself humming and singing to the tune as I sweep to its rhythm.

"Draw a circle, that's the earth,

Draw a circle, that's the earth..."


	7. Spanking

I squeal and squirm beneath Mister Austria's foot.

"You placed the soup spoon and the salad fork on the left side of the plate! What is the matter with you? Do you not remember that everything goes on the RIGHT side of the plate? I thought you had a photographic memory!"

"Why does everything have to be set all formal anyway?" I squeal. "Most likely we won't use one of those utensils!"

"Can you remember what I told you to do yesterday when you first arrived, Mister Brainiac?"

"To do everything you tell me to do without asking any questions," I sighed.

"Good. So why are you asking questions?"

"I...I believe that it assists me in my ability to remember how to perform the tasks you assign to me if I know why I have to do everything that way, Mister Austria."

"Well, since you're so smart, Mister Brainiac, I shall leave it to you to figure out the WHYS. Sit down and eat."

Tonight Mister Austria serves _Wienerschnitzel_ aside a bowl of _Rindsuppe_ and a plate of salad, with a cup of tea instead of coffee (cheapskate). I have a hard time cutting the _Wienerschnitzel,_ which, as it turns out, is made out of ground offal instead of the soft succulent veal tenderloin that my family dines upon.

Mister Austria taps his conductor's baton menacingly as he nags me to finish the entire meal. I am able to tolerate the cheap organ meat, it being fried and greasy, but the salad makes me gag, and so does the bitter tea that I try to swallow it down with, so I have to drink soup to force my throat to open to let it down and to wash the flavor out.

"OK, now you shall clear the table, wash and dry and put away the dishes, and then come upstairs for more music practice. You are competent at the clarinet, aren't you?"

"Fairly..."

After I had finished the dishes (by putting them away without washing them, knowing that Mister Austria would never find out as long as he had me doing the dishes, I climb upstairs and, following my ears, find the music room that Mister Austria is practicing violin in.

"Well you are awfully fast. You know that song I played earlier? It would sound so much better if I could hear clarinet in the background. So you are going to practice for when we perform at the Opera Ball later this week."

Mister Austria stands in front of a stand with sheet music on it and begins to wave his baton. I follow, remembering the tune of the song, but my heart cries for a completely different instrument...

"M-Mister Austria..."

"You idiot! WHAT?"

"Not to be, um, rude or anything, but I feel much more in the mood to practice violin right now."

"Well we can't always do what we want when we want to, can we?"

"All I am saying is that I cannot perform at my fullest potential if my heart is not into it at the moment. It would be far more productive for you to wait until I feel like the clarinet before making me practice it-"

"And suppose that you do not feel like it in time for the Opera Ball, huh? Then you will have majorly screwed our entire performance! Now suck it up and practice!"

Never thought I'd have my love of music tainted by becoming a music slave. I reluctantly play the clarinet, absentmindedly listening to Mister Austria's scolding me for not having enough fingers or large enough hands to play it properly, while dreaming of the expressive wail of the violin...

Wonder if this is how_ Onkel_ Wolfgang felt when his parents forced him to play instruments. No wonder he only likes science...

My thoughts turn to science research and inventing in the hour that he has me perfecting my fingering of the holes on the clarinet. Vienna is not only a Mecca for the arts, after all.

"OK, now you get to practice violin for an hour. Are you happy now?"

"Actually, I don't feel like violin anymore now. Can you take me to the University of Vienna so I can show off my skills at controlling the brain at the neuronal level using entanglement methods?"

"No, you wanted to practice violin, so you're practicing violin! Now, since you're so small, you can hold the violin like a cello, your shortage of fingers should not be an issue here..."

"Is that all you care about is music? You say that you represent our country, but being a nobleman who does nothing but practice classical music is hardly a fair representation of Austria! Austria is also a land of influential physicists such as Ludwig Boltzmann, Ernst Mach, Lise Meitner, Christian Andreas Doppler, and Nobel Prize winners Wolfgang Pauli, Victor Franz Hess, and Erwin Schrödinger! Of Nobel Prize-winning chemists Walter Kohn, Richard Kuhn, Max Ferdinand Perutz, Fritz Pregl, and Richard Adolf Zsigmondy! Physiology and Medicine Nobel Prize winners Karl von Frisch, Karl Landsteiner, Julius Wagner-Jaregg, and Konrad Lorenz! Mathematicians Emil Artin, Paul Ehrenfest, Kurt Gödel, Hans Hahn, Heinrich Franz Friedrich Tietze, and many others! Chess grandmasters Rudolf Spielmann, Ernst Grünfeld, Erich Eliskases, Carl Schlecter, not to mention Wilhelm Steinitz, winner of the first ever world chess championship! And let's not forget Sigmund Freud."

"Why don't you just throw in Adolf Hitler while you're at it!"

"What does your title mean, anyway, Mister Austria? Did you win some beauty pageant?"

"They don't have beauty pageants for men, only bodybuilding competitions, such as Mr. Europe, a title once held by Arnold Schwarzenegger."

Mister Austria here seems the polar opposite of Schwarzenegger, whom my younger brothers idolize, watching movies of him that they were too young to see while I sit in my lab and bemoan the fact that my country's influence on their culture extended no farther than that. Needless to say, Mister Austria is no bodybuilder, or even as strong as the average man.

"Wait a minute, how did we come to discussing _Herr _Schwarzenegger? You should be practicing the violin that you want to be practicing so badly!"

"You know what? You are just as bad as my mother! All you care about is music, culture, humanities, arts, with a sprinkling of politics and economics! I try to keep a balance between those and the sciences, which to me are just another form of art, if you really think about it! But you are just a pushy arrogant snob with a... winning appearance, and a sort of charm... that you use to get your way and hide your bad traits!"

Mister Austria tapped the baton on his hand, giving the impression of a stern schoolteacher. His elegant shapely white knuckles clenched over the stick in a wringing motion.

"It looks like... you need some spanking."

I cry shamelessly as Mister Austria lashes at my rear with the baton, making my tail even more bent out of shape with each lashing.

"Go to bed now," he says. He never raises his voice; he always keeps the same snotty, slightly aggravated tone, regardless of his mood, except when he's absorbed in his music.

I find my way to my room, pull the sheets and the overly lacy covers over myself, and sink belly-first into the pillow top, my body withdrawn into my shell. I wonder if he will beat me for scratching up his fancy bedding with the spike on my shell.


End file.
